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Mobile Marketing 2014: Get on board or get left behind

Is your business addressing the huge paradigm shift that’s underway? If you’re wondering which paradigm shift we’re talking about (there’s always something, right?), we mean the fact that more people now access the Internet via mobile devices than desktop devices.

That’s right. For the first time in history, your customers spend more time online using their mobile devices than PCs. This is a major bonus for you if you and your marketing team get on board. It’s time for you to fully embrace your mobile marketing benefits.

Source: truthonhealth.org

Mobile marketing allows you to move in with your customer base

79% of people between the ages of 18 and 44 have their smartphones with them 22 hours of every day. Not only are you moving in, you’re accompanying them through the day and can perch on their nightstands while they sleep. What more opportunity do you need to get your company’s message out there?

Let’s review our marketing options prior to the mobile era. Originally, you needed to know home addresses, spend time, money and energy creating paper content, and mail it out hoping they’d open it or care. So, we moved to email. That was exciting! Everyone loved the words “You’ve got mail!” Then, we were barraged with junk. Highly efficient spam filters, dismal open rates, hovering around 20% to 30%, and addresses that change about every three years make email marketing less desirable.

Enter the cell phone number. Even better – enter the cell phone number that remains the same, even when you move to Timbucktu. It’s like a golden marketing ticket. With this one critical piece of customer data, you have the ability to hang out with your customers, re-market to them for repeat business when appropriate, and continue to get to know them so you can intuitively hone your marketing strategies. Talk about mobile marketing benefits!

Leverage your mobile marketing benefits early

The earlier you get in on the action, the better. Be a part of finding out what works, and your company will reap the largest rewards right out from under your competitors’ noses.

Here are some important mobile marketing facts you should know:

1. Almost 15% of your competitors are onto it. As many of 14% of businesses have already tried some type of mobile marketing tactic. You need to get your strategies in place so you can be a part of leading the pack, rather than trying to scrape by on the crumbs they leave behind.

2. The difference between Mobile Optimized and Mobile Responsive websites.

Mobile Optimized: This means your site recognizes whether your customers are using a PC, smartphone, or tablet and redirects them to the appropriate site format. The formatting changes accordingly so the site is still attractive, the graphics are clean, and it should be easy to navigate.

Mobile Responsive: This is a whole new level of intuitive website design that automatically adjusts the way the site is viewed according to the size of the screen. View it on a PC and it looks one way, minimize your screen and it appears another, switch over to your smartphone and you’ll get another view…all of which are proportional, attractive and user-friendly. This will take an entire website re-design to be effective.

Either way, your site must be able to load quickly, be visually appealing and easily navigable to reduce your bounce rates; 30% of your mobile users will bounce if your site takes longer than 6 to 10 seconds to load.

3. Texts rock!About 97% of adults 18-44 who own mobile devices are able to receive text messages. If that’s not enough to excite you, consider that the mobile open rate is about 97%. Compare that with the aforementioned 20% to 30% open rates associated with email marketing and you can see an obvious benefit of mobile marketing.

4. Offer and they will buy. The goal of a coupon is to get a new customer to buy stuff, or to get an old customer to buy stuff, in the hopes that they will remember how amazing you are and keep buying stuff. This principle fails quickly when coupons go unused. However, for some reason, mobile coupons are redeemed 10 times more than their traditional counterparts. What mobile coupons can you offer your customers to inspire future sales?

5. Mobile trumps social media? Perhaps. Social media marketing is powerful, and can certainly help you develop your brand…with people who have social media accounts. However, there are those who don’t. In fact, while 50% of Americans are on Facebook, 92% have mobile phones. Mobile marketing benefits may trump your social media gains.

This is an exciting time for businesses who embrace disruptive technology and progressive marketing tactics. The question is: will you be one of those leading the change or will you be lagging behind?